


Another Story

by owlways_and_forever



Series: The Mischief They Create [10]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Character Death, Lily Evans backstory, The Book Thief Narrative Style
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-09
Updated: 2020-09-09
Packaged: 2021-03-06 16:35:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,825
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26381986
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/owlways_and_forever/pseuds/owlways_and_forever
Summary: Even after death, there is another story to be told. And this is the story of a vivacious girl with bright red hair.
Series: The Mischief They Create [10]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1888561
Kudos: 4





	Another Story

Even after death, there is another story to be told. Perhaps I am not the right one to tell it, but then, who else will?

I met her on the day of her birth. She was tiny and pink and screaming, but she wasn’t the one I was concerned with. It was her mother, lying in a bed and hemorrhaging after giving birth, who was the object of my attention. And yet, I couldn’t help but steal glances at this perfect little baby being attended by the nurses, as we waited to see whether her mother would cling to life or teeter over the edge. I kept turning back to her, unable to resist the pull of her jade eyes. So unusual, for a baby to have green eyes. Only hours old, and yet her visage already spoke of kindness as deep as the sea.

Perhaps things would have been different if I had not been distracted by the squirming infant, but perhaps not. I have no control over these things, despite what people might think. The mother lived, but not without sacrifice. This new child would be her last; there would be no chance for another. When I finally left the room - there were, after all, lots of other dying patients who needed attending - it was with considerable effort. I wanted so badly to shirk my duties and stay with that little baby, who for inexplicable reasons, had absolutely captivated me.

o . o . o

It was a long time before I saw her again, though not as long as it should have been. She was five years old, but I recognized her immediately. She may have grown, but I would have known those eyes anywhere. Jade green with whorls of deeper emerald, and more kindness than I had seen in another soul. I wasn’t really supposed to see her. I was there for someone else, and she was just being wheeled down the hallway, her arm bandaged in a bright green cast. She had been playing with her older sister, climbing trees, and she had fallen. But despite the trauma, she was laughing. Her floral dress displayed skinned knees and freckled skin that told of days playing in the sun. She was radiant and happy.

Her sister looked upset, her mother worried. And yet she smiled. There were no tear tracks on her face, no sign of anything amiss besides the cast on her arm. Once more, I could not tear my eyes away from her. I stood fixed in the hallway as she rolled away, longing to follow her magnetic pull. But duty called, and when she rounded a corner, I turned my attention back to those waiting for my care. I wanted to see her again soon, but I hoped it would be a long time. She did not deserve my presence.

o . o . o

It turned out that it would be a mere two years until I next saw her. A car had come out of nowhere, in the dead of the night, had hit them at high speed. The car had flipped twice, metal crunching with each new impact. Her mother had broken ribs and several abrasions, but she had been lucky. Her sister had a nasty concussion, a few broken bones, and a cut across her forehead that would require several stitches. But it was the girl and her father that were in the worst shape. He had been driving, and she had been sitting behind him, on the side where the other car had hit them. Her spine was damaged, her skull cracked, her arm rebroken where it had been before, and both her legs had been fractured. And the internal damage… It was considerable. If she was bad, her father was worse. A punctured lung, internal bleeding from everywhere imaginable, and broken bones galore. They were in operating rooms side by side, and I went between them both. I knew that one would not survive, but I didn’t know which it would be.

Her monitor started to flare, the alarm sounding shrill and piercing to my ears. And I prayed. For the first time in my very long life, I prayed. This girl was too special and far too young. Even I knew it wasn’t her time yet. She had so much to offer the world still. There were so many things she had to do.

Chest compressions did nothing, and the paddles were brought out. There was a frantic effort to find the source of her distress, and I thought that if only my heart could beat for both of us, she would be fine. And suddenly, the alarm stopped. It just stopped and showed the steady up-down of a regular heartbeat. For a moment, I was relieved. And then I heard the alarm sound from the operating room nextdoor.

But I was horrible, and I thought _Good. Let it be him._ I could handle it if it was her father. That would be fine. But I would fall to pieces if it was her. I didn’t want to leave her side, but it was time to do my job. I slipped into the adjacent room, where her father was dying, just in time to hear the final toll of his machines.

Over the following weeks, I would check up on her. It wasn’t technically something I was supposed to do, but I couldn’t resist. She was in pain, both physically and emotionally. Her world had been turned upside down and her body had been ripped apart. I stood behind her at the funeral, her red hair flying in the wind, matching the leaves on that October day. She tried not to fidget in the wheelchair, her only movement that of her hand as she wiped away her tears. I wanted to stay, to watch her forever, to make sure she was alright, but I knew better. I had work to do, and she would be better without me.

o . o . o

There were many chance encounters over the years, but mostly at the expense of others. Once the war started, I saw her frequently. Friends were snatched away, enemies were felled. Battlefields were strewn with bodies, as was typical of war. I didn’t care, so long as hers was not among them. She had become a fiery young woman, filled to the brim with fighting spirit. But she was kind as well. She wanted to change the world, not destroy it. I was not supposed to take sides, but even I could see that those who opposed her were fighting for evil. 

I watched as her friends departed from her one by one, and I stole glances at her each time. There were more than a few close calls, when I watched from the sideline and wondered if she would walk away. More than once, I found her during a happy moment. Just to see her smile, rather than her eyes brimmed red with tears. It wasn’t strictly in the job description, but I couldn’t resist. I was no one to her, she never noticed my existence, but she had come to mean so much to me. I wanted so terribly to see her get everything she ever wanted, to watch her achieve the pinnacle of happiness.

But I could feel her thoughts, her emotions. I knew how much the separation from her sister weighed on her mind. I knew how much grief darkened her heart after her mother passed away. And perhaps I alone knew how she felt that she was wasting her life as she lived in hiding, biding her time until the war was over - at someone else’s hand - and she could reenter the world completely. She felt that her mind was falling to pieces, only her husband and her infant to talk to every day. She felt guilt at being unable to do anything useful, at letting everyone else take all the risk. I pitied her, in truth. She was living like a caged animal, and that was no life for someone so special.

o . o . o

I met her last on the day she died. Evil came for her son, but she was determined that he would not succeed. I climbed the stairs behind her, but I glanced back from the top. Her husband stepped forth, and he fell. There was nothing to be done about it. I kept moving, the evil following me like a shadow creeping. The nursery door was shut, but that proved to be no obstacle. It was blasted open, and evil stepped inside. She stood in front of the crib, not cowering in fear or desperate, but with her head held high. It is often said that people are unafraid in the face of death, but they almost always mean that they did not show fear. But not her. She had no fear, at least not for herself. She feared for her son, of course, but mostly there was defiance and love. I could feel it. Ultimately, she fell too, in a burst of green light and screams as pain ripped through her body in her last few moments. As I focused on her body on the floor, I nearly missed the evil being vanquished by the little boy she had protected. 

I wept for her. It wasn’t the first time I had wept for a human, but the occasions were rare enough. There had been a little book thief many years earlier, and oh, how this one reminded me of her predecessor. Both courageous, tenacious, both struck by circumstances of unimaginable tragedy. 

I had the privilege of escorting her soul away, though it gave me no joy. There was some consolation in knowing that she would be with her husband, but not much. Even I don’t know what kind of life lies beyond. I know that there is something, but I merely escort them to the threshold. It is my curse never to step through the doorway. She was brave in that moment too, as her soul stepped into the unknown. She turned around at the last moment, giving me a curious look. It broke my heart that she looked at me like a stranger. All the times that I had been by her side throughout her life, and she knew none of it. She had never felt my presence as I had always felt hers. But even in her lack of recognition, there was kindness and acceptance. There was not the revulsion that twisted so many faces, no trace of the terror or hatred I so often saw. Her expression was an olive branch, and it would be enough to sustain me for decades of ferrying souls.

Her story is one of courage and love and kindness. I would know, better than anyone, I who witnessed her whole life. It was a story that proved, once again, that even Death has a heart.


End file.
